August update!

Well…. I picked my first PEACH from my tree!  Been eating a few blueberries and raspberries but no blackberries so far.   There are only a few strawberries but at least the plants now have a home and I look forward to more. There are bunches and bunches of grapes.   Have picked 5 or 6 eggplant and a few more cucumbers.  A billion tomatoes will ripen real soon... probably during this next heat spell.  I've had a few peppers and 2 carrots are growing (the tomatoes pushed them out..  have to find another place for them). The squash, melons and watermelons have suffered because I'm a procrastinator but there is still hope. Most of the apples are rotting on the tree (gotta figure that out) but the pear tree is amazing  I'm looking forward to rhubarb next year and will figure out a way to get to the cherries before the birds do!  Pretty darn cool, huh?

Ready for blueberry bushes….

Well …. not exactly..  there is the matter of wire to keep rabbits and voles out and
Oh yes..  dirt and straw and once I’ve gathered all that,
THEN the bushes can be transplanted there and I won’t have to watch Jake and Brita crash through them where they are!  What was I thinking!!  ! 

Blueberries!

Look carefully and you’ll see!!
  

AAKKK… What’s this??

On my blueberry bush?

Book on Blueberries

(In my KINDLE library)

Blueberries in Your Backyard:
How to Grow America's Hottest Antioxidant Fruit for Food, Health, and Extra Money
(25-page Booklet) [Kindle Edition]

From the Author

Of all my books and articles, I am proudest of this one. Blueberries in Your Backyard describes the perfect storm that has caused berries prices to shoot sky-high in stores. For antioxidants and good health, no other fruit compares. But you will learn how to escape this dependency on store bought berries forever by growing some of your own bushes.

If you've heard that blueberries are difficult to grow, that could not be further from the truth. Once you give them the right kind of soil (the ingredients described in this book are affordable and widely available), blueberry bushes are among the easiest plants to grow in the home garden. With very little care, they grow like weeds and the berries are delicious. I recently added a picture of some of my berry bushes to this book; my kids are picking those berries right now!

Blueberries

So I had to protect them from dogs and people walking over them but the tomato cages clearly weren’t bright enough since I almost fell over one while walking through the yard.  So…  what else…  green fencing with leftover green Christmas greenery…  remember it going to snow!!!

   

Blueberry bushes

Blueberry bushes I lovingly planted with good dirt, etc.(first 2)

Blueberry bushes Ernesto planted while I was in the hospital
by digging a hole, putting the plant in the hole and putting
the same clump of grass back that he dug out!  

Blueberry Plants Productive When Beds Get A Raise

Right down my alley….  I think the blueberry bushes are going to get a raise!

The practice of growing fruits and vegetables on raised beds has proved to be successful for blueberries, providing growers with a cheaper, more beneficial alternative production method.

Ohio State University research has found that blueberries grown on raised beds produced comparable yields to blueberries grown on flat, tile-drained soil.

"We can say with 90 percent certainty that raised beds are sufficient for blueberries," said Dick Funt, an OSU horticulturist. "There's no need to install a costly tile drainage system when a grower can get equal or better yields on raised beds."

Blueberry bushes…

So the grass was growing around the bushes – 2 of which were planted for me while I was in the hospital…  Someone mentioned cardboard around them so I soaked it in the pool and put it around the bushes…  so far so good!  And Brita was such a help!